Chapter 1 : Damn you… whoever brought me here
The awakening was painful.
Especially for my eyes.
A dull, throbbing ache pulsed behind my eyelids, as if two hot coals had been sewn into their sockets.
With immense difficulty, I managed to pry them open.
The light, dim as it was, stabbed into my retinas like a thousand tiny needles.
Squirm.
My eyelids fluttered in a weak rebellion.
I found myself inside a strange room.
The air smelled of strong antiseptic, stale sweat, and something faintly metallic, like old blood. It resembled a hospital room, or perhaps a nurse's station. The walls were a dull, sickly beige, and a single, flickering lantern cast long, dancing shadows that seemed to watch me.
In a matter of seconds, I managed to regain control of my body.
A body that I had felt resisting me, every muscle and tendon screaming in protest at the mere thought of movement.
My ability to move it felt… foreign. Like trying to pilot a rusted, broken machine.
But I told myself, "I must get up."
Creeeak.
The rusted machine groaned in protest as I shifted slightly.
But while I was attempting some feeble, failed attempts—a pathetic twitch of a finger, a weak shudder in my leg—I heard the sound of footsteps.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
The sound was crisp and deliberate on the hard floor, growing steadily closer.
I turned my head, a motion that sent fresh waves of agony shooting down my neck, and with great difficulty, looked towards the direction from which the sound was coming.
The door, a slab of worn, dark wood, creaked open.
A man stood there, silhouetted against the brighter light of the hallway.
"You finally woke up, (Hideki Sosuke)."
The man who was speaking was wearing doctor's clothes—a simple, light-colored tunic and trousers. At the same time, he was a man who appeared to be in his twenties. He said this in a low tone, and yet, in the tomb-like silence of the room, I was able to hear it perfectly.
My mind was a foggy, chaotic mess. "Who are you? What is happening? My head hurts."
Since he was a doctor, it made sense to ask him. I even began to point to my head weakly with my finger, to confirm the pain.
Throb. Throb.
A rhythmic pounding against the inside of my skull.
At the same time, I didn't focus on the name he had said. I didn't understand what he was referring to with that name, (Sosuke).
The doctor grabbed my hand.
His grip was firm, but not unkind.
"Don't move your body. You were in a critical condition. Your bones still can't withstand movement. Most of them are fractured."
His words were like a physical blow.
My eyes, still blurry with pain and confusion, must have looked utterly lost. I didn't understand what he meant by this. How could a human's bones be "fractured" and yet he could still talk? It made no biological sense.
"Sir, where am I? I don't feel good. I feel like vomiting."
As part of the communication I decided to engage in, even while enduring this pain—as a man trembling from the agony—I decided to explain my feeling at that moment.
A cold sweat beaded on my forehead. The room seemed to tilt nauseatingly.
The doctor's gaze turned serious.
His eyes, a calm but weary brown, scanned my face. He pulled out a small pill from a pouch at his waist.
"Here. This will help."
He placed it in my mouth. The pill was bitter, chalky.
I swallowed it without resistance. What other choice did I have?
After a moment or more, I began to feel relief.
The pain began to recede slowly, like a stubborn tide being pulled back from the shore.
Yet, it was still the most intense pain I had probably ever felt in my life.
Finally, after a minute of suffering, even as the pain lessened a little, I heard the doctor's voice sigh.
He sounded weary, burdened by a weight far greater than my single, broken body.
"I can't believe you survived. Your entire team was destroyed. You are now considered the sole survivor of your team."
Well, now I had to think to understand the reason.
But a part of me, a deep, instinctual part, prevented me from asking the doctor what he meant by "my team."
I didn't remember being with anyone, or any friends, while riding in a car.
The strange thing was, I remembered the last thing I did.
I remembered that after getting out of the car and entering my apartment, located in a lower-middle-class neighborhood in New York City, after a long day of work, I had gone to bed and fallen asleep.
And then, I suddenly find myself in this place.
"Can you explain to me what you mean?"
I ignored that strange feeling after a second. What should I hide? I was injured. Furthermore, there could have been an electrical accident or an earthquake.
Moreover, how could I explain my arrival at the hospital? Was I kidnapped?
If I was really kidnapped, why would my kidnappers take me instead of just taking my organs directly?
And why would a doctor explain to me that I was in critical condition and prevent me from moving?
All these reasons made me ignore the strange feeling in my head that was telling me not to talk.
The doctor, after hearing these words, froze slightly.
His posture stiffened. His eyes, once merely weary, became sharper, more focused. They narrowed, scrutinizing me with a new, clinical intensity.
He then called out to one of the nurses who was standing by the door.
"Nurse, bring the items. The sensory paper, and the special chakra-infused scrolls."
I didn't understand these things. Strange things. "Sensory paper"? In addition to some "strange scrolls"?
I had never heard of these medical terms, even after going to the hospital several times in my life.
I even used to read online the names of many medicines, but I had never heard the names of these things before.
But I accepted the matter. I said in my heart, "Maybe these are things that were newly invented and I didn't know about."
Science knows no bounds, and there are great advantages to our evolution.
But after the nurse came in, she began to pull out several papers that resembled tree leaves, their surface rough and fibrous.
Rustle.
The sound was dry, like autumn leaves scattering.
She placed them on my body. They were cool to the touch, sending a faint, tingling sensation through the thin fabric of my medical gown.
I looked at the doctor to ask what was happening, but he didn't seem to have a lot of time.
A green energy began to wrap around his hand.
My eyes widened.
I didn't know what to say. Perhaps due to shock, I couldn't even utter a word.
Something was done to me that I could not have imagined.
After the nurse placed the papers on my body, he began to use those other scrolls.
The doctor made strange gestures with his hand, his fingers weaving intricate patterns in the air.
Fwoosh.
A faint, emerald luminescence enveloped his fingertips.
And suddenly, I felt a shock in my head.
It wasn't a physical blow, but a psychic one. A pressure of information, faster than the speed of any computer engine in the world, entered my head.
It was like a memory chip being burned at maximum speed, searing data directly onto my neurons.
The sensation was indescribable—a roaring, chaotic flood of images, sounds, and emotions that weren't mine.
In the end, the doctor stopped.
He looked at the nurse and said, "I think this method we obtained from the Yamanaka clan will help this young man regain his memories."
In truth, the doctor had used one of the experimental techniques acquired by Konoha Hospital, which stimulates the brain using chakra directly. An experimental technique.
But since the doctor knew that the faster he used these techniques, the more efficient the chance of restoring the patient's memories would be, he used it immediately without delay.
The results would appear after a few minutes.
He watched the patient lose consciousness and asked the nurse to stay by his side until he woke up.
"Yes, sir, I will do so."
In the end, the doctor, (Genji), looked at the boy and sighed. The green light around his hand faded, leaving behind the smell of ozone and crushed herbs.
"It's a pity the war is still going on. Children will have to go to the battlefield again. But this is all I can do at this time, which is to help the patients."
(Genji) left with a heavy heart to treat more patients in the emergency department.
His footsteps echoed down the hall, a somber rhythm in the grim symphony of the field hospital.
Tap. Tap. Tap. Fade.
...
I lost consciousness.
And I woke up after several hours. I knew that from looking at the clock on the wall. Its ticking was a metronome counting out my new, terrifying reality.
Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.
My body had begun to feel better. I even moved several times without pain.
But despite that, my face was plastered with a single set of emotions: madness, confusion, fear, and extreme disbelief.
The reason was simple.
I had discovered something unbelievable.
I had been transported to the world of shinobi.
The world of Naruto, specifically.
During the Second Shinobi World War.
And not only that, I was in the same era as Minato, the Yellow Flash.
How did I know that?
It seemed that after that doctor used that strange technique—which I now recognized, after remembering this body's memories, as a chakra technique—I had regained the memories of (Hideki Sosuke) before he died.
He was a shinobi of Konoha.
A civilian-born orphan.
He had joined the academy at the age of five and graduated at eleven.
He was lucky to be placed in a team with a strong Jōnin from the Nara clan.
Furthermore, his teammates were from the Hyūga and Akimichi clans.
Thus, he managed to survive for three years during the Second War, albeit with difficulty.
But in the last mission, while his mission commander from the Nara clan was about to tell them to retreat after completing their mission—which was to secure the supply lines for the shinobi army coming from the Land of Fire to the Land of Rain—a surprise attack occurred.
It was an ambush.
The real (Sosuke) couldn't react in the appropriate moment.
He was the most ordinary among them.
Their Jōnin was taken out in a single blow.
From (Sosuke)'s memories, I was able to see the event in detail.
It was a well-orchestrated plan aimed at eliminating the Jōnin from the Nara clan, and then wiping out the clan members.
In the end, (Sosuke) was supposed to die, but he wanted to commit suicide, so he used an explosive tag.
Fortunately—or unfortunately—the tag exploded.
But he was near the explosion.
His head hit a tree.
Crunch.
The shinobi from the Land of Water thought (Sosuke) was finished.
At the same time, a group of Konoha shinobi arrived to provide support.
The enemies fled.
But (Sosuke)'s team had been completely destroyed.
Only one survivor remained, who died in the treatment room before my soul entered this body and took possession of it.
After finishing the recollection of the events, only one word remained in my mind—(Sosuke)'s mind—our mind.
"Damn it, you're joking with me, aren't you?"
How could I be transported to another world? This is madness.
But there was something wrong…
Why couldn't I remember who I was?
Even after remembering the events related to (Sosuke), I remembered what I had done in my previous life, but I couldn't remember my name or my face.
Yet, I was able to see (Sosuke)'s memories perfectly, knowing his name.
And in some way, even his soul had merged with mine.
His memories, his pain, his training, and everything else—all these things had merged in my head.
A cacophony of two lives, two consciousnesses, fighting for dominance in a single, broken skull.
"I must calm down or I will go insane."
I screamed in my heart at the chaos that was in my head, demanding it to calm down.
I took deep, shuddering breaths.
Inhale… Exhale…
Trying to quell the turmoil in my head.
Finally, after a few moments, I had calmed down a little, even if it was just a meaningless act.
And I began to state the facts, my new, horrifying reality.
I had been transported to the world of shinobi during the Second War.
I was now in the same era as Minato.
I remembered that because I had obtained (Sosuke)'s memories, which showcased Minato's brilliant figure in the class.
And finally, I was now without a team.
And all of this happened just because of falling asleep after work.
Also, my memories from my previous life… I didn't know who I was, and I didn't know anything about myself.
Nothing.
Except for a personality that was still me, now merged with (Sosuke)'s memories.
I was in a state of turmoil.
Who am I?
Am I that person from Earth?
Or am I (Sosuke)?
Who am I, exactly, at this moment?
This question repeated in my head for what seemed like an eternity before it finally stopped with the sound of the door opening.
Creeeak.
The doctor, who had made me lose consciousness hours before, entered again.
"Chūnin (Hideki Sosuke). I'm glad you're awake. Did you regain your memories?"
The doctor was looking at me expectantly, as if he was expecting something to happen.
But I understood what he was thinking. I had seemed, when I first woke up, as if I had lost my memory. But after his action, I had regained my memories—or at least, (Sosuke)'s memories.
I didn't know what I should call myself, but at this time, I had decided to accept the name (Sosuke).
"Yes, Doctor. I remembered. I lost my team… What exactly will happen to me now?"
Of course, I didn't comment on my rank. I had remembered it from (Sosuke)'s memories.
"Don't worry. You are now in a central medical tent. The war has ended. The end of the war was announced one hour ago."
The doctor's voice was scattered, distant. He had been thinking about the children who would go to their deaths, but while he was working on healing the rest of the patients, he heard the news of the war's end.
"The war… has ended? This is…"
Before he could continue, memories from my previous life on Earth flooded into my head.
The doctor didn't understand why the young man, who should have looked pleasantly surprised by the topic, had stopped.
But he said, "Yes, the war has ended. Now, injured shinobi like you will be sent to Konoha Hospital. Furthermore, your mission pay will also be sent to your bank account in the village, so you can get the money for your mission."
The doctor decided not to mention the death of (Sosuke)'s team and avoided the matter.
He didn't want to cause the young man another psychological crisis, especially after the memory problem that had been treated thanks to the Yamanaka and their mind-healing technique.
In the end, the doctor left again after mentioning that (Sosuke) could get out of bed at any time he wanted. His body had been healed.
"Thank you, Doctor."
In an artificially quiet voice, (Sosuke) spoke.
But in his heart, there was a wave of shock.
Other memories were coming into his head.
About the Naruto anime.
It was the story of a manga.
His mind went black.
And while staying in the room alone, he said in a voice that was half-shocked, terrified, and disbelieving, the words dripping with a grim, newfound certainty.
"You are wrong, Doctor. This war… it hasn't ended. It will return after five or six years."
He said these words while remembering the information from the anime.
He knew that his future was going to be very dark, especially since he was a shinobi who could only look at the wall and curse in a low voice filled with a hatred he didn't know he possessed.
A hatred for the cruel fate that had chosen him.
"Damn you… whoever brought me here."
---
──────────────────────
Thank you for reading, from the author! ❤️ 🙂
──────────────────────